Love and Understanding
by Maevenly
Summary: Starbuck is in fine form, Kara is hurting and Lee decides to find out why, with a little help from Apollo and Helo. Some language involved.
1. Chapter 1

Title- Love and Understanding  
Author- Maevenly  
Part- 1/2  
Date- 09/19/06  
Rating - Part One: PG13  
Pairings/Characters - Lee/Kara, Helo.  
Word Count- 3327  
Category- Short Story  
Genre- Romance, Angst, Drama and Humour.  
Archiving- The Fallout Shelter, Apollo/Starbuck Fan Fic, all other's  
please ask  
Warnings- language, for now  
Spoilers- After The Farm, but before Pegasus

Disclaimers- I don't own these characters and I don't make any money from writing these stories

Summary- Starbuck is in fine form, Kara is hurting and Lee decides to find out why, with a little help from Apollo and Helo.

**LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING: Part One**

"Listen – I do not care HOW long it takes, Specialist. You are going to detail that Viper, inside and out, until it looks as shiny as it did when it came off the assembly line. DO I MAKE MY SELF CLEAR?" Tyrol roared at the deckhand who had the distinct misfortune to be directly responsible for Galen being summoned to the XO's office and coming back to the hanger bay with a new orifice.

"But Chief – let me explain." The deckhand stammered.

"You have two choices, Specialist." Tyrol stepped closer to man serving under him. Looking down at the Specialist, Tyrol was pure intimidation when he delivered the other option

"The second choice involves me, strapping your naked ass to that cockpit over there," the Chief swung his arms to point out a Viper sitting behind and to the left of where he was dressing down his employee. "Now imagine the look on her face when she comes in for her maintenance shift and sees your sorry, shivering ass inside her Viper. What'll it be?"

Tyrol grunted derisively was he watched the deckhand waste no time in making up his mind. Nobody, not even the Chief, frakked with Starbuck's bird and kept both their testicles. Blowing some of his bad mood out of his nose, he tossed one more look at the specialist and decided that scrubbing scorch marks off of another Viper that some nugget had seared the frak out of when he got too close to another nugget's burner, was punishment enough for the lecture Tigh just gave him.

Stomping off to his Tool Room, Tyrol yanked open the hatch and slammed it shut. Various projects in different states of completion were all over the workbenches and tables. Scanning the room, something seemed out of place. Walking across the room, everything seemed in place – but something was off. Further back, behind an engine that was being reconstructed, was his still. The purveyor of the Chief's Special Brew out of which flowed a key bargaining chip when he needed something. No – the still was fine. Nothing was wrong there. Stacked on the floor, were bottles of his brew, still sealed and untouched.

"Oh, no. Please let me be wrong." A flash of insight flared. Moving aside a box of cleaning rags that never went to the laundry; he jimmied metal plating out of the wall and peered into the hiding spot. "Frak me."

Out of every batch he made, he made sure to set aside one jar in order to age it, make it a higher quality product. Higher quality meant higher proofage. Higher proofage, better quality translated to him being able to barter beyond a ship-to-ship capacity. It meant that he had something to trade with on the black market.

Out of the fifteen bottles he knew were in there, two were missing. By process of elimination, he had a fifty-fifty chance of knowing who might be able to shed some light on his missing bottles. That is, once this person recovered from the hangovers of all hangovers.

Coming out of the Tool Room, Tyrol barked.

"Get me the C.A.G. – and do not use the ship-wide frequency."

BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG

Lee Adama was agitated. Here he was, on his day off, coming off three days of double shifts and a marathon Triad game, and does he get to go to his rack? No. He has to go and pull a babysitting gig, courtesy of an irate Chief. Well, he was not going to do it alone. It was a big ass ship and his quarry could be anywhere and there was the distinct possibility that his subject could double back to an area he had already searched. He was in no mood to chase his own tail. Cally, Helo and Racetrack each had a section of the ship assigned to them with strict instructions to report to him immediately should they come across the target and to play dumb should anyone else ask what they are doing – especially the commander.

Marching through the corridors, those who were foolish enough offer him a salute were given a terse nod in acknowledgement before he narrowed his eyes at the person who was interrupting the mission.

A buzzing in his ear had him tapping his earpiece in response. "This is Apollo. Go ahead."

"Target acquired." Helo's voice echoed in his head, as well as a lot of other chatter.

"Copy that." Lee stopped in the middle of the corridor and looked around him, "Location?"

"Central Mess," Helo responded.

"Stay there and establish a perimeter. I'm on my way." Turning on his heels, Lee changed the direction he was heading. "Don't do anything until I get there. Tell Cally and Racetrack to abort and fall back to primary positions."

"Copy that, Helo out."

The closer he got to the Mess Hall, the longer he had to graduate to be being outright pissed. He could hear his target clear out into the corridor, long before the door to The Mess came into sight. Crossing the threshold, he came up alongside Helo, who was propped against the inside of the door. Gaining the other man's side, for intends and purposes it looked like Lee was asking Helo what was on the menu.

"Where is she?" Lee asked, as his eyes quartered the room and scanned it section by section.

Pulling his lollipop from his mouth, he used it to point out the location of their target.

"There."

Lee all but groaned when he saw her.

Kara was standing up on top of one of the tables and was in the middle of a story that had every one howling with laughter along with her.

"Here I am, a lowly cadet, already on probation, puking my guts out. I know you know what I am talking about – the kind of puking where you expect your shoes to come out of your mouth? Anway. So here I am," Starbuck was all laughter and interrupting herself with her own laughter. "Lying on the floor, my head hanging on the side of the toilet, my shoes somewhere inside the toilet bowl, when the Senior Cadet comes into the lavatory and asks what is going on. I look up at him, reeking of alcohol, no shoes…"

Despite being pissed, Lee did not scowl at Kara's retelling of one of her more infamous escapades while at the Academy. And the fact that she was fixated on the fact that she puked up her shoes. She was plastered. A full-fledged, Dionysius channelled, Bacchanal fuelled bender. There were two things that made him smile. One was the fact that it would not be him nursing the hangover of the year when the alcohol left her system and two was the relief that she chose one of her stories – and not one of his – to tell to the entire crew.

Taking up a place on the opposite side of the doorframe as Helo, Lee settled his shoulders against the wall. After all, despite the fact that he could probably launch a Viper with what was currently flowing through her veins, it was a damn good story and she was telling it well. As long as one ignored the parts she repeated.

"So I look up, I look like crap-"

"Like you usually don't, Starbuck?" Someone catcalled from the audience.

"Frak you, you mother frakker. Meet me later and I will show you what a really ugly mother-frakker looks like." Cocking her head to one side, she brought a bottle to her lips and took a deep pull. "No – wait." She looked around and made eye contact with everyone else before settling on her heckler once again, "That would be me – holding up a mirror in front of your face!"

A spattering of 'damn!", "tough luck, kid', and 'that's a kill!" sprang up from the group sitting and standing around Starbuck as the appreciation for her verbal slam of the heckler reverberated across the room. Lee looked at Helo and they both shared a look of appreciation for her skills at one-liners, especially with her being as incredibly intoxicated as she was.

"So where was I?" Starbuck's face split in a goofy-drunk smile. A self-deprecating snort sounded as she asked the group about her story.

"About to take another drink," someone called out.

"Damn straight I was. Good call." She brought the bottle to her forehead and used it to salute the other person.

Chugging the brew for several seconds, she pulled the bottle away.

"And, without missing a beat, I clutched my right side," Kara brought the hand that held the bottle to her right side, re-enacting what she did that night, "And said – Oh! The Pain!"

Everyone erupted into more laughter.

"There was NO WAY I was going to be caught, ladies and gentlemen, for drinking on campus. I was underage, a first-year cadet, I was on **PRO-BA-TION** and I was – did I mention underage?" She repeated herself. Shaking her head, as if the thirty or so people around her suddenly became ninety people standing around her, it only took her a moment to recover.

"So, I FEIGNED appendicitis all the way to the Infirmary." She swung the bottle in the direction that the Infirmary she saw in her memory was located as applause and whistles sounded from those suitably impressed.

Helo, hearing this story for the first time, kept his eyes in Starbuck but spoke to Lee. "Must be nice to live out of the box like that, heh Apollo?"

Lee stifled the chortle that trickled his chest.

"There is only one problem when it comes to thinking like Starbuck. When you live out of the box for so long that you become a round peg trying to get into a square hole. You can do it – providing the square is large enough – but it never becomes a tight fit."

Nodding at Lee's insight, Helo narrowed his eyes at Starbuck once again as he watched her take another swig of the aged brew.

"Ten to one, she falls off that table before she takes her next shot."

Lee did not answer. His initial agitation was all but gone. Starbuck would be fine. Starbuck knew how to handle her liquor. Even of Starbuck landed on the floor, Starbuck would land on her feet. It was Kara he was concerned about. For Kara to retreat fully behind Starbuck's antics meant that she was hiding from something pretty painful and was counting on oblivion to be her ejection seat.

"And this – this was the best part." She took another swig. "Here I am, on a gurney, in the Infirmary, with an IV in my arm and a nurse walks by and makes a comment over the fact that I seem a little dehydrated. Gee? You think so? I just spent all night drinking and then puking. There is no WAY I could be dehydrated."

Starbuck voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Anyway – keep my mouth shut and pretend to doze off. A little while later, another nurse, an older Nurse Hatchet-type comes by. She makes a show of looking at my chart, looking at my drip and looking at me. She gives me this serious look and tells me – me! – that she cannot release the results of my blood work on account of patient confidentiality and that why don't I just tell her what is really wrong – you know – so that they can treat me better."

Lee actually thought that Helo might be right when he saw Starbuck wobble a little on the table as she built up to the climax of her story.

"So, I look up at her. And you know when you are drunk and you are at that place where paranoia starts whispering all sorts of strange things in your head? Well. I look at her, I think about the fact that I now I have been in the Infirmary for four hours and have sucked down two bags of fluids. I tell myself that I have now have two options. I can either tell the truth or not. Without missing a beat – do you know what I did?" She questioned her audience.

"What?" Many voiced asked at the same time.

Apparently unsatisfied with the collective answer, Lee and Helo watched as she did a complete circle, on the table, with the bottle extended at full reach, and ask again, this time near the top of her voice.

"Do you know what I did?"

"NO!" Everyone was caught up in the master storyteller's tale.

Drawing the bottle close to her right side, she pretended to collapse as a full body laugh racked her body.

"OH! THE PAIN!"

A resounding, enthusiastic, crowd-well-pleased applause filled the mess hall. Even the cooks, with spoons in their hands, came out for the punch line.

Taking his cue from Lee, Helo pushed himself free of the door jamb and together they worked their way across the room. Coming to a stop when he reached the table Starbuck was currently hold court from, Helo stretched out his hand to help her down.

When she refused to take Helo's hand, Lee watched as Karl began to disperse the crowd with some well-placed, quietly spoken words.

Starbuck's eyes were more glazed over than what he saw from across the room. But it was Lee who saw an echo of emotional pain flit around the edges of her face. Her mouth might be laughing, but it was the fact that she chose to tell a story where she screwed up that belied her mirth. Kara was starting to emerge from Starbuck's shadow. Apollo's loyalty to Starbuck mandated – in a context that was as natural and as necessary as breathing – that he watched her back. Lee's friendship and love for Kara made it intrinsic to his psyche to take care of her when she was not able to take care of herself. After all, she and he were connected in a way that transcended anything else.

"Oh no, people – look! It is the Big Bad C.A.G. and he has come to take away all our fun!" Starbuck said to her onlookers.

A groan broke out over the crowd as they were grudgingly made aware of impending shift changes and duties that had to be resumed.

"Okay Starbuck, the show's over. Let's get you down from there." Lee switched to being all Apollo for this one.

Crouching down on her heels, bending her knees, Starbuck used one hand to beckon Apollo closer and the other to brace herself against the tabletop while still holding onto her bottle.

"Wanna know a secret?"

Based on the vapours coming from her mouth, Apollo could fuel an entire squadron of Vipers with what was in her bloodstream.

"If you tell me you are going to get sick all over my uniform, I am going to tell you that we have been there, done that and that if it happens again, I am not going to be as nice as I was last time." Apollo played along with her question and answer game.

Helo raised an eyebrow at Apollo as he filed the need to find out the details of that story under 'Things to Bet With' at the next Triad game when he was out of cubits.

"The floor is moving!" Starbuck said in an overly loud, laugh laced whisper

Silencing the Raptor pilot with curt shake of his head, Apollo looked at Starbuck once more.

"Really now?" Apollo was amused but time was running out if he and Helo were going to get her out of here before Tigh or the Old Man caught them. "Are you going to come down or am I going to have to bring you down?"

Her response was a Starbuck smirk: part sneer, part teasing smile, part challenge. Lee could actually see her try to pull words together to make a coherent thought.

"There has not been a day that has been dawned in which, in your wildest dreams, you could even remotely consider taking me down."

"Hey Kara," Helo brushed Lee slightly to the side and came up on his left.

"Helo! My friend – you are my friend, right?" Starbuck listed a bit to her right before she regained her balance.

"You know it. The way you saved my ass back in Caprica, kicked some Cylon ass and brought me home? Hell yes, we are friends. This is why I am going to let you in on a little secret of my own."

"Oh! I LOVE secrets. I just told Apollo one and I know he won't tell anyone." Starbuck said as she put her fingers to her lips and turned them like she was locking them shut.

"Okay. Ready?" Helo asked.

Lee felt Helo shift him slightly back and centre of Starbuck.

"Lay it on me, my friend!"

Lee had to only adjust his stance a little to the left in order to catch a Starbuck that had been knocked out cold by Helo popping her in the jaw. She was not hurt; the Gods knew that they had done worse to each other. She was just knocked out and by the looks of things; any bruising would be minimal.

Sliding her up until her waist bent over his shoulder and her arms dangled down his back, Lee looked at Karl like the other man had read his mind.

"I was about to do that, you know."

"Yeah – but if you did it would be just one more thing between you two that she may not forgive you for when she wakes up. This way, she can forgive me after she has gotten me back and you can claim plausible denial ability." Clapping Lee's spare shoulder, Helo moved away and back towards the door.

Poking his head out, Lee was on his six when he said, "Okay – coast is clear."

Stepping out into the corridor, Lee double checked Helo's assessment. Snugly fitting one arm behind Starbuck's knees to keep her in place, Lee extended his free hand to Karl. "Thank you – we owe you one."

Popping his lollipop to the other side of mouth, Karl brandished the mostly empty bottle of brew. "I'll make sure to get this back to the chief. And, I will look forward to a full debriefing after you are released from Sickbay."

Hearing Helo's chuckles fade as the taller man walked away, Lee had to smile.

When it came to the woman he would lay his down his life for, one thing was certain when it came to Kara Thrace. It took only one interaction with her to decide whether you hated her or loved her.

Heading down in the opposite direction and avoiding some of the more populated corridors, Lee thought it was interesting that the people who hated Kara were the ones who feared her the most.

Hauling around sixty-seven inches of feminine muscles was something he could do for a while. Doing so while not getting caught by someone who would report that the C.A.G. was carrying an unconscious lead pilot was finite. It would probably end up with both of them in the brig.

With that thought in mind, Lee caught the next lift to C Deck and the last place anyone would look for either of them.


	2. Chapter 2: A Heart's Mission

Title- Love and Understanding  
Author- Maevenly  
Part- 2/2  
Date- 09/21/06  
Rating - Part One: PG13  
Pairings/Characters - Lee/Kara, Helo, Honourable Mention: Cmdr Adama, Zak  
Word Count- 5647  
Category- Short Story  
Genre- Romance, Angst, Drama and Humour.  
Archiving- Fan Fiction. Net, The Fallout Shelter, Apollo/Starbuck Fan Fic, all other's  
please ask  
Warnings- language, for now  
Spoilers- After The Farm, but before Pegasus

Disclaimers- I don't own these characters and I don't make any money from writing these stories

Summary- Starbuck is in fine form, Kara is hurting and Lee decides to find out why, with a little help from Apollo and Helo.

**Love and Understanding: Part Two**

"Where are we going?"

She was confused. Something Lee could understand. In StarbuckLand, she was still on that table, telling stories, in Central Mess. Not hanging upside down and draped over her friend's shoulder with her head bouncing lightly between his shoulder blades.

"Somewhere safe," Lee reassured her.

"There is no where safe, Lee." It was Kara's – not Starbuck's – voice that was muffled by speaking into his shirt.

"You let me worry about that, okay?"

A resounding laugh echoed off the walls of the corridor. Starbuck was back.

"A-Poll-O…" Her tone was sing-songy.

"Yes, Star-Buck-EE…" Lee played along. He needed Starbuck if they were going to get to where he was taking them. And the only way he was going to get them there, he was going to have treat his plan like a mission; change is mode of thinking to achieving objectives.

"You had better not be taking me to the brig." Starbuck's syrupy sweet voice was more potent then most of her tirades.

"Starbuck – would I ever do that to you?"

BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG

_**Objective: Look both ways to make sure we were not followed.**_

"Apollo – did you know that you put on two different coloured socks?"

"Really Starbuck? I had no idea until now." Lee feigned surprise. Her grip on the backside of his pants slackened after her discovery. Feeling his pant legs fall back into place, he verified his location – they were almost there. Which meant this most the dangerous part of his mission. If anything was going to go wrong – it would be now.

He had to keep her occupied to minimize the odds of getting caught. The Gods knew that Starbuck could get into trouble on a rogue comet with nothing around her but ice and dust; being on a Battlestar teeming with more than two thousand personnel meant it was open season and their hides were the bounty.

"Remember that time in the Academy when you pretended to be passed out in order to get past the MP's?"

"Yeah – that was great, wasn't it? You were so smooth. I did not know you had it in you to pull a stunt like that."

"I need you to do that again for me – okay? And, do me a favour. Stop smacking my ass every time you take a breath, will ya?"

"I thought you might like to be spanked." Drunken snort-laughs puffed against his back. And then she stilled. And then giggled some more. "I know I do!"

"Gods, Kara – you're going to kill me." The mental image she invoked was almost enough to make his break his stride. Changing the subject to the mission at hand, "I mean it Starbuck – you gotta pipe down or you are going to get us both busted."

"I'll be very, very quiet. He'll never know I'm here." Her exaggerated whisper was almost as loud as her regular voice – except her regular voice did not break into giggles at every third word. Apollo did not even want to know who 'he' was that she was referring to.

Lee shook his head. As if anyone could miss Starbuck slung over his shoulder.

_Almost there…_

Check: objective accomplished.

Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx

_**Objective: Get keys.**_

"Corporal – do you have a minute?" Lee hailed the Officer on Duty and prayed Starbuck would play her part like she promised.

"Sure Captain, what do you need?"

Lee saw the older man roam his eyes over the rump that was attached to his shoulder – like the Officer could identify his passenger by the shape of their ass. He figured he had three different ways to plat this: Apollo looking out for his wing-mate, Lee looking out for his friend or the C.A.G. who needed to keep his ace pilot out of hack.

"The lieutenant here has been into The Sauce and with the stunt she pulled last week…" Captain Adama let his voice trail off. "But with the rotation schedule the way it is…"

"You wanna hide her from the XO?"

"Need to is more like it - and anyone else who happens to come along. You know how it is. If you are the boss, and someone 'calls in sick', and there is no one else to work…" Lee played the overworked-underpaid empathy card to its fullest without going over the top. He needed the other man to look the other way, not spread the word that the C.A.G. was in over his head.

"I hear that. Last week, I got stuck with two extra shifts, back-to-back, because some kid thought he could squat-press twice his body weight and not end up in sickbay with a hernia."

"Think you can help me out – officer to officer?"

Lee curtailed his need to wince when the corporal walked behind him and stopped in front of Starbuck. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the older man reach for her chin and look at exactly whom he was being asked to protect. He sent a prayer to every Lord of Kobol that Starbuck was finding this funny enough to keep her mouth shut and eyes closed.

Coming back around, the Officer of the Day snapped his heels together and saluted Lee sharply.

"This little lady is the reason why this ship is still flying. Captain – we have an understanding."

_Check: objective accomplished._

BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG

_**Objective: Secure the room.**_

"Take all the time you need." The corporal told Lee.

"Are you sure?" Lee was getting good at this – getting what he needed without the other man finding out. Starbuck's M.O. must be rubbing off on him more than he thought.

"No problem. I'll re-route everyone to D Deck and say that this section is being scoured due to an infestation of head-lice." The corporal puffed out his chest at thinking up such an excellent reason to re-direct anyone from this area of the deck.

_Check: objective accomplished_.

Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx

_**Objective: Dog the hatch.**_

"Apollo – where are we?"

"We are just about there." He could not resist having a little bit of fun with her.

"Apollo – what are you doing?"

"I'm getting us there before we get here."

Lee could feel her shake her head against his waist as she laughed.

"You are such a goof when I am drunk."

_Check: objective accomplished._

BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG

_**Objective: Get Starbuck off my back before she tears out my spine.**_

"Frak you, Apollo – you are SO in the frakking frak-house!" Starbuck was pummelling the traitor's back.

"Knock it off Starbuck. If you get hurt, you will only have yourself to blame." Lee was struggling to get her down and on her feet without her hitting the floor.

Unable to catch her arms, he swung her around and stabilized her with a hand between her shoulder blades as she found her footing.

"You frakking PROMISED ME!" She hissed at him, spacing out her feet and shifting her balance as her boots came down on solid ground.

"No – I was humouring someone who stole some of the chief's Extra Special Brew and nearly polished off the entire bottle all by her lonesome."

_Check: objective accomplished._

Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx

_**Objective: Lock the door behind me so that neither one of us can get out.**_

It was a scramble to see who got to the door first. She had every intention of jarring the door open and making an escape. He needed to keep it shut if he was ever going to find out why Kara unleashed Starbuck to her fullest capacity.

Thank goodness she taught him how to fight dirty so well.

_Check: objective accomplished._

BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG

_**Mission: Face the Hellcat and take everything she is going to dish out. Seize the first opportunity to draw Kara out from underneath the safety net that is Starbuck.**_

"You've locked us in the frakking BRIG, Adama!"

Lee crossed his arms and for the second time in an hour settled his shoulders against a cold metal wall. At least this time he had a view. An irate Starbuck was a force of nature and as such, she was as beautiful and equally terrible to behold. One hundred percent fury, one hundred percent skill and one hundred percent committed – that was Starbuck, Lieutenant Thrace and Kara as individuals and as a collective whole. Three hundred percent of anything was a staggering amount. As it pertained to her? It was a hell of a package. Sure he heard the comments about how seeing Starbuck in a full blown temper led to longer showers for both some of the male and assorted female members of the crew. But none of them had delusions of anything more than what they could conjure in their own imaginations.

He had stood toe to toe with Starbuck and walked away a better officer. He had his skills as an op-planner challenged by Lt. Thrace and come out of the experience a better tactician. He had even gotten an apology from Kara but, in the aftermath, ended up feeling more childish for reacting the way he did then justifiably indignant when he held her accountable for her perceived sin.

But those were the public moments that had witnesses to spread the tales of how Lt. Thrace said that his plan sucked, of how Starbuck told Apollo to stop being everyone's friend and how bunk-mates would whisper about how Kara would get lost in thought looking at a battered picture attached to the mirror in her locker. Out of all these people, how many men actually got to see how soft Kara's eyes were when she was lost in thought when she believed no one was looking or the smile that transformed a pretty girl to an ethereal goddess? She was danger and duty and womanhood packaged with determination, personal power and a crippling vulnerability that could break the heart or heal a soul. He knew of only one other man who knew what he did – and that man was dead.

"Really?" Lee made an effort to look around at the walls, bars and the spartan décor. "You know what? I think that there has been a fresh coat of paint applied since I was here last."

"Just another shade of grey, Apollo," Starbuck rolled her eyes and planted her hand on her hips as she started to pace. It was not lost on him that she was talking about more than just the colours of the walls.

Lee made sure he kept his expression neutral and his gaze on Starbuck. She could –and would – do almost anything at any moment.

Like charge up to him and not stopping until she was virtually underneath his chin and screaming in his face.

"Let me out – right frakking NOW!"

Looking down at her, her eyes ablaze, her cheeks flushed with colour and her stance feral, his response was simple.

"No."

Spinning away, she fell back to a far corner of the prison cell and roared at the back wall.

More pacing, more back and forth marching as she swore under her breath and promised retribution he was only too glad he could not easily hear.

"Lee – don't make me do this." Slightly calmer, a little spent; she looked at him as if he were asking her to never fly again.

"Do what, Kara?" He saw the cracks in her Starbuck persona that started in the Mess Hall begin to deepen. He just needed a little more time and then he could start to help her – she just had to help herself first by telling him what was going on with her.

"I can't do this." She held up a hand and waved it in defeat, like she knew that whatever it was, it was beyond her ability to cope, "Not here, not now and most definitely not with you."

"Why not, Kara?"

It was a fight not to end this now. To leave and not force this situation any further – the pain in her face was spreading to the rest of her body. She had given him his father back. She had given him her loyalty, trust and taught him what it meant to live. In a way, she had even given him Zak back. But it had cost her. That much he could tell.

"Because you are _you_ and I am _me_ – don't you get it?" Any lingering traces of her being affected by the chief's brew were gone as she fully sobered.

The way she looked at him made it seem as if the answer was written in bold letters on floor in front of them.

"Do you know what I did yesterday and last night?"

"Yes. For the most part, you spent the day working on getting Vipers flight-worthy. You flew a last minute refuelling run to the Aerilon Maiden, came back, hit the showers and then joined me, Helo, Tyrol and Cally for a game of Triad before hitting your rack." Lee made sure his voice was even as he re-counted what he knew what Kara did last night. "Then this morning, you disappeared."

"If you know then why are you still talking to me?" Panic and pain tinged with disbelief filled out her question. Her eyes danced around his face, looking for some clue as to why he would even have her within twenty feet him.

Making sure she got nothing from him, not a rise, not an answer to her question, not one word was when she exploded and launched herself at him.

Getting two fistfuls of his uniform, she demanded to know the last thing he ever thought he would ever hear from her mouth.

"THEN WHY AREN'T YOU HATING ME!"

The meaning of the phrase 'rolling the hard six' suddenly became crystal clear as a pair of green eyes shimmered brightly with barely leashed tears.

"Kara – you hate yourself enough for the both of us."

That sentence had her releasing her grip on his clothing but his next words had him wrapping his hands around her upper arms and giving her an unhampered view of was at the apex of where his soul met his heart met his mind.

"And because I can't."

Her wrists came up and a violent twisting motion had her free of his embrace and retreating to the far corner of the cell. Turning around and zeroing in her gaze on him, Kara's cheeks were dry but her arms were clutched tightly around her waist.

"Do you know why I was not scheduled for anything yesterday, my classes were cancelled and why I am not on the flight roster today?"

The fact that her question was rhetorical was not lost by him.

"Because the Old Man told the XO to make sure I wasn't, that's why." Her expression was a sneer but it was directed inward, at herself.

"Because YOUR FATHER figures that I am supposed to be nursing a huge, frakking hangover right now and that I should be unfit to fly because of it. That he knows how frakking frakked up I am and gives me a wide berth all day with the understanding that we are supposed to get together at the end of the day for awhile before I go and crawl back into my bottle. But no – I go and FRAK IT ALL UP!"

He could not say anything – this next step had to be hers. But he could not keep the muscles in his jaw from clenching releasing as the powerful emotions rolling off Kara hit him full force.

"I never got trashed yesterday. I never met with your father last night. I did my job. I played frakking Triad – with you sitting next to me – the best reminder of them all as to what I was supposed to be doing and do you know what I did instead? I won three hands and lost two. That's what I did. And I had a good time doing it. Wanna know what I did twelve hours before that? I frakking talked to Zak, while I was working on those Vipers. I talked to him. Not screaming at him for leaving me behind. Not at leaving scars that run up one side of you and your father and down the other. Not for reliving the sounds, smells and the blazing fireball that claimed his life. No Kara Thrace Pity Party for me. No – I am too much of a frak-wit to even do that."

He wanted to reach out to her, but he had no clue where to start. Of course he knew it was the anniversary of Zak's death, but he never knew it hit her so hard. Pieces were falling into place, but he needed her to go a little bit further and stopping her now would be a mistake. But she was on a roll, and barely took a breath before she started to cut herself up again.

"No. No it was not until I was in my rack, looking back over the day, when it dawned on me why I was talking to Zak so much: telling him that I was glad that he is in a better place, telling him about the picture that sits on your father's desk of the three Adamas standing on a tarmac, telling him that I think that you and your father have established mutual trust and respect and the beginnings of a father-son relationship and that it won't be long before that fully blooms as well."

She was close to breaking. Lt. Kara 'Starbuck' Thrace was as close as she had ever come in twenty-six years of being alive to fracturing.

There was just one more thing he needed to know to put everything together. And she just gave it to him as he watched her crumble in a heap on the floor and bury her face in her hands as dry, wracking, sobs shook her from head to heel.

He was by her side and cradled her in his arms before she could curl herself into a ball. A flash of fury made him want to scroll back time, to before the Holocaust, to seek justice against the persons in her past who hurt the woman in his arms so badly that she believed she was not worthy of being loved for who and what she was, not what she could bring and represent.

He was snapped out of his reverie by her struggling to get up, to slip back into Starbuck-mode and pretend that everything that was said in the cell never occurred. He let her get as far as sitting up and sitting cross legged before he scooted closer and reached out his hand and stopped her from going any further.

Now, it was his turn.

"Kara. Look at me."

Running the backsides of his fingers down along her temple, he trailed a feather-light caress along her cheekbone before swivelling his wrist and stopping when his thumb came to rest along the length of her jaw line. Exerting the slightest pressure tilted her face so he could look at her eyes and banish the fear that had no right to claim residency in those beautiful green irises.

"Kara. My father – your father – loves you for the daughter he always wished he had and found in you. Not for the son you tried to replace. Nor for being a widow he saw as his responsibility to take care of and protect. He loves you for all of you that _you _are. He is not an easy man, and he did not raise easy sons. You are not an easy woman, Kara Thrace, but by the Gods you are as much his daughter as me and Zak are, and were, his sons. He earned the right to hand pick every member of this crew and it was a privilege he exercised to the fullest. You are here because you belong here. He is not going to cast you aside and out of his heart because you are healing. If anything, he is going to be so proud of you and love you even more now that he can see that the level of pain you have been carrying is diminishing. No parent, friend, or lover has it in them to see their child, friend or heart-mate in pain without feeling it themselves."

He could feel the beginnings of his own chin tremors as he watched large, emotion filled tears well up, over flow and succumb to gravity.

"How. Can. You. Say. That. To. Me?" Every word was a struggle for her to get out and was separated by ragged, fortifying breaths. "I killed him, Lee. I killed-"

Lee stopped her in mid-sentence.

"Yes. You did, Kara."

He watched as her eyes glazed over as she began to relive her decision to pass Zak despite him failing his check ride. Then he stopped her again.

"But so did I, Kara. And so did Dad. And, Lords this is hard to say, but so did Zak. All four of us are responsible for him not being here today."

Before she could protest and take all the blame back on herself, he shared what he had only come to terms with recently himself.

"Kara. As much as we are guilty, we are also vindicated. It is a paradox: Zak, needed to prove something to himself by enrolling in Basic Flight and not bailing out when he knew it was not for him, Dad, instilling the need for his sons to be Viper pilots and not recognizing that his sons may have different aspirations or aptitudes outside the cockpit, me, for not loving Zak enough to make him stop and really look at his motivations for being a Viper pilot but also feeling a sense of pride in my little brother going where I already went, and you for loving Zak so much and seeing the pressures that existed between all three of us that you took it upon yourself to deliberately pass a failing student."

Taking a deep breath, he formed the words he had rehearsed a hundred times in his head.

"Kara – I cannot ask you to forgive me or our father until you forgive yourself."

"Help me, Lee. Help me do this. I don't know how to do this."

He had to blink several times to keep his own tears at bay as her whisper tore words from her heart and soul that had never been spoken out loud in this kind of context.

"It's scary but doable, Kara."

He let her see a flash of what it felt like for him to forgive himself in the wake of his epiphany. It felt like Zak had died all over again, that every harsh word he had ever spoken to his father in private and to the Old Man's face echoed scathingly in his ear and the image of the cemetery attendants filling in the grave and patting squares of turf back into place coalesced into one blinding, mind-numbing, heart stopping burst of pain. But then, the peace that came in the aftermath was inexplicable. It was astounding the effect of shedding one sin out of many can weigh on a psyche.

He was spellbound as he watched the one emotion after another flow across her face and through her body. Shock at what he was offering her, denial in her ability to actually do it, anger at being cornered into making a decision. But something was preventing her from taking that last step.

"Forgiving yourself for Zak does not mean that you stop atoning for your sins, Kara."

That's what did it. That was what broke through her final barriers. That's what touched her inner-sanctum of pain and destroyed it, leaving not even a splinter to prick her heart on and make it bleed. A scar was in its place. Fresh and pink and barely closed and that is what he saw when she launched herself into his arms once more – but not out of self-loathing, but out of the need to touch another human being, to make contact with someone she knew loved her, because he had the ability to love himself to a certain extent and teach her how to do the same.

The tears that dampened his shirt he would cherish. They were shed for him, his father, his brother and, most importantly, for herself and it was her gift to him, whether she knew it or not, of how she trusted him with more than her life. She entrusted her soul and heart into his safe keeping. But nothing comes for free. She could only entrust what he had offered in willing exchange.

He found himself crying as well. Because it dawned on him that Apollo and Starbuck were joined in the sky, Captain Adama and Lieutenant Thrace were connected by honour and duty, while he and Kara were fused together by love. Souls, minds and hearts irrevocably interconnected between all three of their different personas.

This time, when she pulled back, it was not in retreat, but to look at his face. He was transfixed as she lifted a trembling hand and moulded it to first one side of his head and then the other while she used her thumb to wipe away his tears.

A weak smile and a half-hearted Starbuck smirk had him chuckling despite the amazing moment that was ebbing and flowing around them.

"Guess I should change your call sign to Puddles, huh Captain?"

"Do that, and not only will I bust you down to Ensign but I will make sure you scrub every ship in this fleet from the outside-in all the way to Earth."

His promise carried as much weight as her threat.

Leaning into the hand he pressed against her face, she was not done asking questions.

"Where do we go from here?"

For them, a certain kind of honesty always existed and now was not time to change that.

"I have no idea, Kara."

"You know what Lee? I think we don't have too."

He was caught up in the smoothness of her cheek against his palm that he almost missed a quiet hiss of discomfort when he brushed against the right side of her jaw.

Dropping his hand, he stood up and did not offer to help her up. He knew better. He would not love her the way he did if she were any other way.

Brushing off her backside, she ran her own hand against the slope of her jaw.

"Helo really punched me?"

"Yep – he really knocked you out. One punch and you were out like a light."

"In front of how many people, Lee?" Starbuck asked.

Fitting the key into the lock and swinging the door wide, he let her walk out first but only because he could only pull the keys out once he had relocked the door to the cell.

"Now Starbuck, don't go there. He only did it because he likes you." Apollo warned.

Unlocking the hatch and pushing against the handle, they both stepped out into the corridor.

"And you let him?" An accusing finger was pointed right at his chest as they walked side-by-side down the corridor.

"Well… Yes and no. I did not know what he was going to do. But I can tell you that if he didn't, I was going to."

"Thanks, Apollo – that makes me feel a WHOLE lot better."

Starbuck shot him a look that was entirely unreadable.

"Now – remember Starbuck…. It was for your own good…"

Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx

_One week later…_

A report had come down from Tactical that The Rising Star was having difficulty maintaining gravity support capabilities and that a Raptor crew should be assigned to transport parts and technical personnel to fix the problem.

Walking across the deck with Helo, Lee saw Kara hard at work pulling apart a panel on her Viper. With the amount of personal modifications she had made to her bird, Lee was itching to see what he – Starbuck's Viper was always a 'he' – could do. As it was, she was so engrossed in what she was doing to see him staring at her.

Touching base with Tyrol and handing off the pre-flight checklist to Cally, Lee hooked his fingers onto his helmet and gave her one more look before boarding the Raptor. If all went well, he would be back from the Rising Star within the hour. This would give him plenty of time to come up with something worthy of her being distracted from her precious Viper.

Chuckling at the thought, he settled into the pilot's seat, with Helo right behind him as E.C.O., secured his helmet and launched.

BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG Xxx BSG

"When I get my hands on her…"

"Excuse me Sir, but with all due respect I think I get first dibs on the Lieutenant." Helo countered as he rubbed his neck against the stiff collar of his flight suit.

"Listen, Lieutenant – we would not even be in this mess if it weren't for you." Lee challenged the larger man walking and talking beside them as he ran his hands through his hair.

"We are off duty, Apollo so don't go pulling rank." Helo shot his friend a look that would have sent anyone else other than Starbuck running for cover as he scraped his fingernails along the hairline directly behind his ears.

"Okay – fine. Whatever. I say we get what we need – as quietly as possible – and then go get her. I think that the depth of the water reservoirs needs to be checked, don't you?" Apollo asked as he resettled his hair, root to tip, one more time.

Running both his hands over every area of his face and head, Helo whole-heartedly agreed.

"That's an affirmative – measured from the inside out without the benefit of an air tank or respirator."

"How do you think she did it?" Helo asked, wanting to bang his head against a wall for two reasons. One of which was for thinking Starbuck would let bygones be bygones.

Entering Sickbay, Apollo scanned for a likely subject. Someone who could get them what they needed without alerting Doc Cottle.

Summoning up every essence of charm he possessed and cramming his hands deep within the pockets of his flight suit to keep temptation at bay, Apollo was seconds away from approaching one of the newer duty nurses when a firm hand latched onto his shoulder and the smell of cigarettes wafted up his nose.

"Captain Adama, Lieutenant Agathon – for some reason I am not surprised to see you this afternoon. Step into my office, won't you?"

The gravely voice of the physician with the least attractive bedside manner in the entire fleet kept one hand on each of their shoulders and steered them into an awaiting area.

"Now, let's see here." Making a show of not picking up a pen or creating a chart, Doc Cottle lit a cigarette and blew out a long stream of smoke before looking at the two men about to crawl out of their skins.

"A certain green-eyed imp, standing about yea tall," Cottle raised his hand to a height of sixty-seven inches and fought to keep a straight face, "Told me that you two might be in to see me today. At first, I was convinced that you were making a social call, that you missed my sparkling personality. But then, this same imp – you know, she really is a wealth of information – reminded me of the bio-hazard team I had to dispatch to C Deck last week on a fool's errand."

Lee knew his expression had to be as confused as Helo's. But it was nothing compared with what Doc Cottle said next.

"Ah – screw it. Thrace and I worked out a whole script to torture you with but I am too old for these kinds of games." Cottle snuffed out his cigarette and drew himself up to his full height.

"Adama, Agathon. You both are grounded until you get an all clear from me. You cannot have one hand on the throttle and one hand scratching the hell out of your scalps at the same time. Also – to add further insult to injury, Thrace and I decided – as she will be acting C.A.G. until your flight status is re-instated," Cottle looked at Lee specifically, "that out of _consideration_ for your fellow pilots and the well being of the general population of the ship, that you both should willingly assign yourselves to the brig until such a time that I am completely satisfied that you are completely lice-free."

"Think about it, Lieutenant." Looking at Agathon, Cottle gave him a disparaging eye-roll. "What do you think she did? She spiked your helmets with critters."

Pulling another cigarette out of his pack, Cottle peered at both of the men standing in front of him, barked out one order and walked away, grumbling over how one did not even have to be able to think to become a Colonial officer.

"Permission to scratch!"


End file.
